Israel waiting on Kosovo

Israel is taking a wait-and-see attitude toward Kosovo’s declaration of independence from Serbia.

A statement from the Foreign Ministry on Monday said that the Jewish state “was following the developments and will formulate its position later on.”

In the meantime, the United States and several major Western European powers recognized Kosovo on Monday after the province declared independence Sunday.

Kosovo was the southern region of Serbia where a war between Kosovo’s majority ethnic Albanians and Serb troops ended in stalemate in 1999, after which the United Nations administered Kosovo.

Israel has strong historical ties to Serbia, which opposed Kosovo’s independence. In a December interview, an Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman told JTA Israel would not be the first country to recognize Kosovo, but said it would not be the last, either.